60 Transactions.— Miscellaneous, 
thousand miles. I much regret my inability, authorities differing so 
greatly in the origin of this race. 
Although the natives of Australia are surrounded by savage nations 
using the bow and arrow, Cook did not observe any such weapons among 
them, only lances and darts, thrown by hand or with a throwing-stick. 
I have sufficiently trespassed upon my hearers’ attention, and I must ask 
to be excused for the length of the paper. It is only by following out the 
particular customs of savage tribes, and inyestigating the construction of 
their language, that the cradle of birth of any particular gens can be ascer- 
tained. I trust Mr. Colenso will, at some future day, favour us with a 
paper, setting out more minutely than he has even yet done, the manners 
and customs of the Maoris. A higher civilization is wiping away the habits 
of a more barbarous time, yet to the ethnological student, these habits, 
manners, and customs are deeply interesting. 
Note A. 
I may be allowed to refer briefly to various matters in which the Maori 
resembles Eastern Polynesians. The shape and carving of the New Zealand 
war-clubs exactly resembles those in use among numerous Pacific Island 
tribes. Their custom of taboo is exactly similar. In the mode of burying 
the dead, some of their customs, especially that of wrapping the body in 
mats, were similar. Their method of wearing mats, and working ordinary 
basket-kits, is the same. Their mode of mourning—cutting the hair and 
gashing the body—is alike. Their traditions all point to a migration, or 
migrations at different times, from one or other of the South Sea Islands. 
Their language is alike. Their great god Maui is but the god of the Sand- 
wich Islands. Their method of house-building is alike. Also painting the 
body. The custom of tattoo is more severe (the Marquesas excepted) than 
in any other Pacific Island, The very word tattoo is similar in many islands 
(it evidently is derived from the Tongese verb ta, to strike.) The use of the 
waist-cloth is common. Their adzes are alike, so are their drinking eala- 
bashes. In the habits of cannibalism they but resemble their ancestry. 
Their mode of fastening the carved head-work of a canoe to the sides is 
exaetly similar to South Sea practice. The Church Missionary Society's 
Museum contains models of single and double canoes exactly similar to 
those found in the Pacific. Carvings, houses, and all their war-pahs were 
generally erected upon an eminence. Cruise refers to one erected at 
Wangaroa situated upon an eminence 800 feet high. I have seen exactly 
similar forts in Fiji. The word pa or pah is the very word used by the 
people of the Hervey Group, if I remember correctly. The Sandwich 
Islanders, in Cook’s days, were in the habit of saluting visitors by crushing 
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